Kenosha, Wis. – Saginaw Valley State University baseball started their four-game Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) weekend at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside with a bang on Friday. Originally scheduled for one game, the Sunday game was pushed forward with weather expected so the Cardinals and Rangers had two games this afternoon. SVSU took both with the biggest offensive performances they've had this season in both games winning 24-3 in seven innings and 21-10 in nine.
SVSU (16-18, 8-7) had their first multi-home run games of the season with three long bombs in the first and two in the second. The Cardinals also accumulated 53 hits in the 16 innings of play against Parkside (9-21, 3-13).
The first two innings were scoreless in to start the day. Tyler McLaren (W, 7-0) started game one pitching five innings allowing two unearned runs and striking out seven along the way. Saginaw Valley got the scoring started in the third. A Colin Cornwell double scored Tucker Roe and Connor McClennen making it 2-0.
Four more runs for the Cardinals came in the fourth. Brandon Scheurer singled home Martin Money to make it 3-0 before Roe doubled the lead with a three-run home run. Roe finished the day 7-for-10 with two doubles, a home run, six RBI, and eight runs scored. Parkside starter Daniel Llanas (L, 0-6) had all six runs against through his four innings of work.
The big inning in game one was a 10 spot in the fifth. SVSU sent 15 batters to the plate scoring 10 runs on 11 hits. Jeffrey Reseigh had an RBI sacrifice fly, McClennen had two two-RBI doubles, Roe and Cornwell both doubled home one run, Austin Schweiger hit an RBI single, and Martin Money hit a two-run home run.
Parkside tallied two runs in the bottom of the fifth, but the onslaught continued. Seven runs in the sixth gave SVSU a 23-2 lead. Cam Steeves tripled to right to score Brady Carpenter, Ethan Rose hit a two-run home run, Logan Welch singled home Brendan Conkle, Mark Harden III singled home Parker Jatczak, Carpenter drove in Welch with a single, and Ethan Dufresne wrapped it up with an RBI single scoring Ethan Burdua.
Carson Bassett and Thomas Shipley both pitched an inning in relief. Bassett had a clean inning and Shipley game up one run on two hits and struck out one. Both teams added one run in the seventh bringing it to the final of 24-3.
Game two went nearly the same way for SVSU. JJ Arbini (W, 1-2) got run support early and had three runs against through five innings of work. He struck out six on the way to his first win of the season.
The Cardinals took the lead in the second and never looked back. Seven runs in the inning on eight hits as Scheurer and Jaccar Watkins had RBI singles, Money drove in two with a base hit, Roe scored a pair with a double, and Colin Cornwell scratched one across with an RBI fielder's choice. Every run went against Rangers starter Nicholas Schouten (L, 0-1) who only made it through two innings.
The lead grew to double digits in the third. Cornwell walked with the bases loaded before Schweiger recorded an RBI on a fielder's choice and Reed Raymond singled one home making it 10-0.
Both teams scored three in the fifth. Cornwell scored Watkins with a triple and Schweiger hit his third home run of the season, a two-run shot. SVSU scored three more in the sixth before five runs for Parkside made it 16-8 in favor of Saginaw Valley.
Jackson Decker pitched the sixth and had the five runs against, but with a strikeout that reached base on a passed ball, four of the runs were unearned. Drew Cooper pitched two scoreless innings striking out three batters, the same as Decker.
Watkins tripled home a run in the eighth and SVSU scored four in the ninth with an RBI fielder's choice for McClennen before a three-run home run for Dufresne. Kameron Marnon pitched the final inning allowing two runs, one earned and struck out one.
Watkins finished the day 5-for-9 with two runs scored. Colin Cornwell had a 5-for-8 day with two doubles and a triple with seven RBI and four runs scored. Reed Raymond also went 5-for-8 over both games with a triple and two runs scored.
UP NEXT
SVSU and Parkside have another GLIAC doubleheader on Saturday to wrap up the weekend and the season series. SVSU is up 4-0 in the season series looking to sweep it with game one starting at 1:05 p.m.